Golf clubs: Through her eyes

Clubs have worked hard to get women through the door. What happens next decides whether she comes back.

If you’ve ever pulled into a golf club carpark for the first time, you’ll know the 10 seconds I mean. You haven’t swung a club in months, years or ever. You may have come alone, which took more nerve than anyone inside will realise. And you have about as long as it takes to cross the carpark to decide whether this place is for you, while a voice tells you you’re not good enough, have not practised enough or are not the sort of person who belongs here.

I came to golf from the outside, so I know that voice well. The first time I walked into a club, I stood just inside the door for what felt like a very long time, reading a noticeboard I had no interest in. Everyone else seemed to know each other and the language on the walls – comps and pennants and handicaps – might as well have been Latin. A woman behind the counter finally looked up and asked if I was lost. I wasn’t, quite. But that one question is why I came back.

What strikes me, working on this issue, is how little of that decision has to do with golf. It’s about whether anyone looks up when you walk in. Whether the language on the website makes sense to someone who has never played, because handicaps, comps and scratch are a language, and when you’re fluent you forget it is one. Whether the women’s change room is as good as the men’s or a cupboard with a mirror. Whether you can find a tee-time that works around school pick-up or whether the good times are long gone, held for years by the same people, though some clubs are starting to change that.

None of that is marketing. All of it is what a club’s marketing is promising. There’s no doubt about it, clubs are working hard to get women through the door. There’s a social tile, an email to the members’ list, a poster by the pro shop, a beginners’ clinic on a weekday morning. All of it is well meant. But a campaign can do only one job, which is to get you to the door. What you find on the other side is the real pitch. I find that the clubs that get it tend to start with people, not the golf course.

So here’s my advice, for what it’s worth. If you’re new, or coming back, trust what you notice at the front door. Whether you’re greeted, whether you’re understood and whether anyone says hello are all information. And if you’re already a golfer, you have more power than any campaign.

Next time you’re at the club, look for the woman who has turned up on her own. Ask her to join your group or at least tell her where the change rooms are. It’s the cheapest marketing there is.

You’ll forgive a lot at a new club. What you won’t forgive is feeling you don’t belong. A campaign can get you to the door. Only the club and its people can make you glad you came.